Switch to biofuel heating may be one green footstep for Vancouver

Creative Energy goes green with its plans to change from fossil fuels

Central Heat Distribution provides heat to buildings that include the main branch of Vancouver Public Library (pictured), BC Place, Rogers Arena, the Queen Elizabeth Theatre and Pacific Centre.

Photograph by: Arlen Redekop
, Vancouver Sun

VANCOUVER -- A local energy utility that supplies heat to more than 210 buildings downtown plans to convert from fossil fuels to biofuels, which would cause a reduction in greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to taking more than 14,000 cars a year off the road each year.

Ian Gillespie, sole director of Creative Energy, said the company has been talking with the City of Vancouver about switching to low-carbon fuels.

“When we do an effective fuel switch and take it off of gas to biofuel, we’ll make the single largest contribution to the GHG reductions in Vancouver,” he said. “By far, nothing is even remotely close.”

Biofuels are energy sources produced from living organisms, such as plant material or animal waste.

Vancouver’s Greenest City Action Plan aims to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 33 per cent by 2020 — a reduction of 1.1 million tons a year in carbon dioxide.

A report by the City of Vancouver said the biggest opportunity for reducing greenhouse gas emissions comes from converting existing steam heat systems such as Central Heat to low-carbon energy. Energy used by buildings generates 55 per cent of the city’s total greenhouse gas emissions.

The city estimates that the biggest single reduction in greenhouse gas emissions (CO2) could come by converting Central Heat, which generates 70,000 tonnes of GHG a year. A reduction of this amount would be the equivalent of the emissions for a year from 14,583 passenger vehicles or the amount of energy consumed by 3,497 homes or 162,791 barrels of oil, according to a greenhouse gas equivalencies calculator from the US Environmental Protection Agency.

Central Heat Distribution, at 720 Beatty St., provides heat to buildings that include the main branch of Vancouver Public Library, BC Place, Rogers Arena, the Queen Elizabeth Theatre and Pacific Centre.

It was founded in 1968 on the idea that having a centralized system to provide heat would mean individual buildings wouldn’t have to maintain their own expensive boilers. A centralized system would save money by lowering heating costs and causing less pollution.

Its six industrial-sized boilers work at full capacity during the winter converting the energy in natural gas and fuel oil into steam delivered by a network of 13 km of underground mains.

The company was acquired by Creative Energy Canada Platforms Corp. last year for $32 million, according to documents filed with the BC Utilities Commission, which regulates energy utilities in the province.

Gillespie said Creative Energy will be doing a call for new biofuel technology this spring. He said he expected to reach a decision soon on the final site of the energy generation plant.

Over time, Creative Energy plans to expand its biofuel system into Gastown, the Downtown Eastside, Downtown South and the West End, he said.

Other neighbourhood energy systems in Vancouver include North East False Creek and Southeast False Creeks.

The city believes a similar conversion of steam heat systems to biofuels at Children and Women’s and VGH hospitals would result in reducing GHG emissions by 25,000 a year. Other neighbourhood energy systems could reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 25,000 tonnes annually.

In 2009, Seattle converted the energy source for a downtown steam system to wood chips and reduced greenhouse gas emissions by 50 per cent.

Gillespie, who is president of real estate developer Westbank Projects, says his role with Creative Energy fit with his ideas about being a developer.

“What are cities made up of? Cities are made up of the built environment, they’re made up of transportation, they’re made up of energy, and they’re made up of the social environment,” he said.

“If those are the legs of the stool, how do we get ourselves more involved in every piece of that stool?

“Now we’re the provider of heating to Vancouver, what can we do to remake that system?”

Westbank’s current projects include the redevelopment of Oakridge Centre and building Telus Gardens and Vancouver House, the 52-storey residential tower by the Granville Street Bridge.

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